I have been an ordained Moravian minister for exactly 30 years as of January 1, 2003. My whole life as a Christian has been in this church. Every year for the last eleven years or so, since I have been in this missionary ministry, I have been required by the Moravian Church, Northern Province to submit an annual report, and on the basis of that report, my status as a minister "under call to specialized ministries" is examined and renewed each year. One of the questions on that report form asks if I am open to call in the Moravian Church. Up to now, every year I have answered affirmatively. But this year, how can I simply answer yes? How can I say I am open to call in the Moravian Church, when I cannot and will not submit to the authority of an apostate synod or to leadership that will not boldly support Biblical positions?

I left the Northern Provincial synod in June 2002 feeling like my mother or some other close relative had just died. I couldn't hold back the tears. I could not participate in the synod communion, but stood outside with about 30 other people instead. My grief was not based solely on one issue, although one issue, of course, has attracted the most attention.

When the resolution #6 on homosexuality was adopted, it passed by a wide margin. It was 153 to 113, as I recall; no room for doubt here, no room to say it was close. The church spoke with a loud and clear voice to "celebrate" what God calls abominable.

Although there may be lingering debate and a perceived need to spin opinions about the subsequent processes entailed by synod's pronouncement (that is, regarding process-specific issues such as the ordination of practicing gays or solemnizing gay marriages), the foundational values have been clearly specified by the synod of 2002: the gay lifestyle is something to be celebrated. Whatever processes may be entailed by synod's statement are post-climactic. A statement of theological import has been made, values have been specified, and those values stand contrary to the teachings of Scripture. Debating about the denouement is tantamount to asking what flavor poison one prefers. The Northern Province has already pronounced a spiritual death sentence upon itself whether or not specific behaviors or process-entailments ever emerge.

The lingering debate among provincial leaders and the subsequent communications from the provincial office betray a vacuum of spiritual leadership and a foggy understanding of the nature of authority in the Moravian Church. The final buck-stops-here voice in the Moravian system is the synod, not the provincial elders. When synod says "celebrate" it means celebrate. The provincial leaders have no right to re-define what synod has stated; clarify, yes, redefine, no. The fear-based attempt at damage control in this matter reflects an inability to let one's yea be yea. It is difficult to yield the kind of submission required by my understanding of "call" to that kind of leadership.

I cannot and I will not submit to people who make God a liar. Psalm 1:1-2 is very, very, very clear. Over the past years, I know, there have been a few church leaders who have swallowed the homosexual agenda. A "few" might be tolerable. But in this case, it was the Northern Province that spoke loudly and clearly, and now the province stands under the judgment of God. I will no longer identify myself with that nor will I be subject to or submissive to such ungodliness. I choose to stand with Jesus.

Left alone and dangling, that last sentence might be well interpreted as haughty and arrogant. It needs further clarification. My opinions have not been narrowly focused on one event or one vote at synod, decisive and resounding though that vote indeed was. My disappointment was reinforced by my committee experience at the Northern Province Synod, the "Faith and Order" committee, charged with dealing with matters of doctrine. Several of us pastors in the Northern Province who share an evangelical faith proposed two resolutions, calling for the Provincial Synod to affirm two core elements of Moravian doctrine. Those core elements were drawn directly from the Moravian "Ground of the Unity," one of the official and most foundational documents in the history of the Moravian Church. We proposed that synod recognize and endorse two specific items within that document: (a) The Triune God as revealed in the Holy Scripture of the Old and New Testaments is the only source of our life and salvation; and this Scripture is the sole standard of the doctrine and faith of the Unitas Fratrum and therefore shapes our life.; (b) We believe and confess that God has revealed Himself once and for all in His Son Jesus Christ; that our Lord has redeemed us with the whole of humanity by His death and His resurrection; and that there is no salvation apart from Him. What could be more basic for Moravians? Out of our group of slightly less than thirty people, only six, perhaps seven, voted to publicly affirm those statements. That's less than 25%. I was shocked, horrified, and grief-struck. Only a quarter.

One of the three bishops in that committee confronted one of my companions in the Gospel and said "I have a good friend who is a Muslim and I wouldn't dream of trying to bring him to Christ." Can you imagine? Another bishop who I know is evangelical remained silent, and when I confronted him on his silence after the meeting, he agreed that he had been motivated by a fear that support for these resolutions might be divisive, and therefore he could not speak publicly in support of something "so controversial". One of the members of the PEC who sat in that committee ridiculed the idea that the Bible alone is authoritative, saying that there are other books equally important. Some suggested that we affirm the Ground of the Unity as a whole and not deal with issues raised by specific parts of the document. That suggestion itself is illogical; how can one affirm the whole and yet deny the parts? If anything, the experiences on that committee called to the foreground the need to highlight and underscore those particular sections that appeared so troublesome. Indeed, throughout the history of the Christian church, even in the pages of the New Testament, there are instances where the Body of Christ has had to focus on one particular doctrinal statement when a core truth of the faith was being challenged. If ever there were a time within the Moravian Church when core truths are being challenged, it is now; yet precisely at a time when those core values needed reinstatement, key leaders within the church allowed silence or error to dominate.

If that committee be in any sense representative of the Moravian Church, it means that those who really love the Lord Jesus, who know that the Bible is our spiritual authority, and who are willing to honestly share their faith are only a small minority. How can I stay submissive to a Church that denies [more accurately perhaps "refuses to affirm"] the uniqueness of Jesus Christ and undermines the authority of the Bible?

I am a Moravian. I am an ordained minister of the Moravian Church. Yet I find myself conflicted by two elements of my ordination vows. I have promised "to live according to the precepts of God's Word and to teach nothing but the truths and doctrines contained therein"; and in the next breath I promised to "conform to the principles, regulations, and requirements of the Moravian Church, as they are laid down by her synods and constituted authorities." I choose to affirm that first promise. I will take my stand on that and I hope to define my life and my ministry by that. I am open to call in the Moravian Church as long as I am permitted to take such a stand, and am released from obedience to that second promise, now voided by synod's apostasy.